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A Friday evening talk has traditionally opened the public programme of the Shrewsbury cartoon festival. This year ‘Cartoonists in Conversation’ aimed to give the public an insight into the lives of cartoonists, whose work they would probably be familiar with but know little about the people behind them.

The number of cartoonists gathering in the town (this year there were 30) meant we had a stellar line-up to choose from. Jeremy Banx (Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Private Eye) resplendent in his beret, The Surreal McCoy (The Spectator, Reader’s Digest, The Sunday Times), Royston Robertson (Private Eye, Reader’s Digest, The Spectator) and Wilbur Dawbarn (The Beano, Private Eye, The Spectator) were joined by Ken Krimstein (New Yorker, Harvard Business Review) who was over from Chicago and brought an international perspective to the chat. Our host for the evening was BBC radio presenter Alex Lester, a festival patron and cartoon enthusiast.

The discussion covered various aspects of life as a cartoonist, alongside some superb examples of their work. Topics covered included the creation of the work and their workspace, some ‘greatest hits’ over the years, stories of rejection slips, offence, their influences and inspirations, and of course a mention of Trump. After the main panel discussion came questions direct from the audience.

Hearty thanks for the success of the evening go to the cartoonists on the panel, and Alex Lester for all being fabulous. The Wightman Theatre set us up wonderfully and Andy McKeown of WildStrawberry.com’s wonderful projection made the evening such a treat visually.

A public kerfuffle over a Gerald Scarfe cartoon published after the recent Israeli elections has resulted in a public apology from Rupert Murdoch the publisher of The Sunday Times, the paper in which the image appeared.

I had originally drawn a cartoon with a couple of old ladies sitting in a car parked in front of Thora Hird who was balanced sideways on 2 traffic cones. One old lady was saying to the other ‘‘Oooh, isn’t that Thora Hird?’’ and the caption read ‘Celebrity Roadblocks’. I soon started wondering to what other uses could celebrities be put? Then to find out who was flavour of the month it was a matter of reading as many celeb magazines I could lay my hands on, whilst using that great excuse ‘‘its for research purposes, no really’’, and drawing them in all manner of undignified poses. This was a few years ago and of course they did the rounds of editors’ desks, dutifully returning each time with the usual ‘‘we really liked your idea but don’t have the money/space/imagination/etc’’ rejection note. Until the art editor at the Sunday Times’ Style magazine had a look at the PCO‘s website, chanced upon my portfolio, visited my site and offered me the gig. Joining the PCO has got to be one of my better decisions.

“I must confess that I have always thought graphic novels were just comic books with literary pretensions. I casually dismissed them as a symptom of our culture’s increasing infantilisation; adults read books, children stories with pictures. Well, having seen Persepolis I’m happy to admit I was wrong.”

Perhaps we can take heart from the last sentence – Cosmo has seen the error of his ways! – but it’s a little depressing to think that anyone could have got that far in life with the attitude that words=good, pictures=bad.

Clearly the PCO has a mountain to climb. But, hey, we’re wearing sturdy boots. Thanks to Rod McKie for drawing the article to our attention.

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